It seems that NetherRealm is one of the first third-party studios to have taken advantage of Switch's 'boost mode', according to our friends over at Digital Foundry. The behind-the-scenes mode, which released with the console's latest firmware update, enables developers to take advantage of increased clock speeds to improve game performance in several ways.

At launch Nintendo limited the console's docked CPU speed to 1020MHz and the GPU to 768MHz. These figures were both substantially below the performance found in Nvidia Shield Android TV, which uses the same Tegra X1 processor as the Switch. In handheld mode, however, the GPU was further slashed to 40-50% of that figure (between 307.2 and 384MHz). While this conservative clock speed helps prevent your Switch from cooking itself into a mess of melted plastic and electronics, it presents developers with some very stringent limitations.

Richard Leadbetter from Digital Foundry has used his tools and considerable nous to test the machine and its supposed new 'boost' mode and has confirmed these improvements with hard data. As we reported last month, temporary CPU clock increases to 1785MHz are helping in certain circumstances (loading screens in Breath of the Wild and Super Mario Odyssey, for example) and it appears that Mortal Kombat 11 is benefiting from GPU speed increases along with Nintendo's games, too. The video explains everything in detail:

In handheld mode all the mentioned titles benefit from a GPU jump from 384MHz to 460MHz helping to reduce the impact of dynamic resolution scaling, among other things. Interestingly, the GPU clock also seems to change dynamically in some situations - a six-minute section of DOOM saw the clock speed change no less than 28 times.

If you're at all interested in the nitty-gritty, we highly recommend you watch the whole video for a detailed breakdown and check out more of Digital Foundry's videos. Their forensic work on consoles both retro and modern is fascinating if you've got a head for numbers and an interest in the challenges that face developers across all platforms. In the meantime, it seems a little more wiggle room for developers is expanding the potential of your favourite handheld hybrid console - everyone's a winner.

Have you noticed an improvement in any of these titles? Is the forest in Breath of the Wild a little less stuttery? Let us know below.

Gavin loves a bit of couch co-op, especially when he gets to delegate roles, bark instructions and give much-appreciated performance feedback at the end. He lives in Spain (the plain-y bit where the rain mainly falls) and his love for Banjo-Kazooie borders on the unhealthy.

Maybe Hellblade too. Overclocking is the secret ingredient of the Switchcraft.

Homebrewers had been messing around with overclocking since firmware 7.0. Nintendo added overclocking functions a long time ago and only recently with firmware 8.0 that they enabled it officially.

Digital Foundry should do a review of emulators on Switch, overclocking enabled amazing performance for emulators like PPSSPP. Playing Patapon and Locoroco on Switch is awesome, like a 2-in-1 Sony-Nintendo handheld console.

@koekiemonster I'd sooner trust Digital Foundry's expertise than "people". Numbers don't lie, contrary to people. If Digital Foundry says it runs smooth and well, then it does, regardless of what some whiners may say, think or feel.

@koekiemonster Still, most of them are users/gamers, not tech professionals who do numbers for a living, and besides that: Resetera is well known for its whiners and toxic community, so I wouldn't pay any attention to anything said over there. They're about on the same level as NeoGAF or Reddit.

@StevenG You don't have to pay anything if you don't want to. They are mostly just cosmetics items. Now the grinding was very real to get the in game currency that some of these items demand. With the latest update that fixed most of those issues.

I find it interesting that we live in a time where, to some gamers this is all that seems to matter. Clock speeds, FPS, "dynamic resolution scaling" lol. It's always been simple for me...1.) does the game run well?2.) Is the game fun to play?That's it! All I need to know because anymore we passed the time when most games looked pretty terrible, so graphics arent a primary motivation, though for many they still are. Could be I've just gotten old.

@koekiemonster They've updated the game a few times now, and it has worked well since day one. They just updated the game again, and they're adding more detail now, like blood marks on the characters. And it looks sharper in portable mode.

@Dilated that's because you're easy to please. If you have experience with 60fps and playing same game and playing on other hardware with much lower resolution and other graphics and even load times speed and 30fps.... it's very hard to go back. We live in 2019 and Switch is low end system. I'm even surprised there is any MKXI release on the Switch with lost of quality. You want to play smooth and nice... which is gone due Nintendos fault by releasing a hardware with such limits. Btw this counts for PS4 and XBOX one as well the first release. Low end system in this time. Now they fixed it with Pro and xbox X but those should be already done at release. Nintendo is behind. Some people care for gameplay well as long you get your joy nothing wrong with it, but people with more awareness how a game could and should be played will not be amused. I hope they will fix it with next Switch release

And I do understand Switch more for children and that's their maingoal, but at least in Gamecube time we got a decent hardware and most games 60fps. I'm missing those days

You’re failing to mention how the Switch is a hybrid PORTABLE. It has to have lower specs to not catch on fire in your hands. And you clearly don’t understand the importance of such hardware if you didn’t grow up playing Gameboy; what Switch accomplishes is nothing short of groundbreaking. We have freaking Doom 2016 and Skyrim; Breath of the Wild and the new Mortal Kombat; Dragons Dogma, Dark Souls and Smash Ultimate... all on the go; to play at will on lunch breaks or long train rides, or anywhere at all. Never before has the gap between handheld and console/PC realm been so small. Look how nice Senua’s Sacrifice looks on the system— it’s mind boggling what optimization can do when there’s expected profits like the Switch library is experiencing.

You’re missing the forest for the trees when you complain about the lower specs of the system. You can’t realistically expect console-level visuals for a portable device at that price

which is why I stick to PC. why would I waste time playing games on inferior systems like the ps4 pro and xbx? I ain't got time for tiled half-graphics resolutions @ maybe 30fps if you're lucky or 1080 @ sometimes diety willing 60fps. only 60? only 1080? what is this; 2008?

@Alucard83 I agree about the GameCube era. So many PS 2, Xbox, and GameCube games ran at 60 fps! When I play GameCube or Wii games on a 1080 TV using component cables they look great. Yes, the 480 resolution is very noticable, but 60 fps looks and plays amazing. I have a gaming PC, but pretty much only game on my Switch (and sometimes other consoles) because I love the compact simplicity of it. I also pretty much only play 60 fps games on Switch. It has to be a really good game, like Kingdom Two Crowns, Breath of the Wild or Mario plus Rabbids Battle whatever, for me to play it in spite of it running at 30 fps. Even then, if a game runs at only 30, I only play it docked. My smart TV makes Breath of the Wild look like a perfect 60 fps. It does the same thing for Rabbids, Twilight Princess, Wind Waker, and even older games like Wave Race blue storm(which looks awesome, way better, at 60 fps through a component cables, well it is coming at 30 fps through the cable then being motion interpolated or dejuddered up to 60 fps by the smart TV). Anyways, I want lower resolutions and higher frame rates all around.

@Antraxx777I agree with everything you just said. To have games like this running as well as this on a portable is actually mind boggling. Anyone who says the Switch is underpowered is forgetting that if it was capable of running PS4 Pro graphics, it would cost close to 1000 bucks and nobody would buy it, meaning no developers would release games for it. Nintendo absolutely have the right idea. It's user experience over cutting edge tech every time and it's a winning formula. Can you play your PS4 on the toilet? In bed? On the train? Nope.

@DilatedI'm with you. I have a Xbox One X with a 75" 4K TV and I haven't seen any games that really blow me away with their visuals; they still just look like games only 'more detailed and shinier'. I also play a variety of other systems all the way down to my 8 bit C64 and after about 20 minutes I forget about how basic the graphics are and just enjoy the games.

Same here. As long as the frame rate is stable, I'm good. 60fps is nice to have, but I don't think I've ever played a game that ran at 30fps that I thought was unplayable. Hell, a lot of the time, I can't even tell.

@Alucard83 You realize that the PS4 and Xbox weren't "underpowered" when they came out.

The Switch is a tablet. It's a handheld that can be attached to the TV. Nintendo themselves have said they aren't competing with Sony and Microsoft. Totally different markets. Nintendo left the console business because they couldn't compete anymore. Fortunately you can now hook their handheld up to the TV...

yes they were. they were super low end PCs at the time they were released.

that crappy jaguar cpu and a terribad ati card in both. xbx and ps4 pro have an up-clocked terribad jaguar cpu and ati card. hell; it took epic to get sony to put 8 gigs of ram in the ps4. they wanted to do 4.

So long as they make more money by making the game worse, they will. These can be changed on the fly, so expect games to make the balance attractive to drive sales, then unattractive once sales drop off to milk the buyers.

@Alucard83I have a PC with a GTX1080Ti and an Intel 7700k CPU, you lost your credibility when you said “people with more awareness, and Xbox one X and PS4 pro Fixed being low end machines” In the same statement. People with more awareness don’t care about technical specs, it’s about game play and having fun, it always has been. This idea of tech specs was only pushed onto the masses to sell hardware when software was lacking. I wouldn’t have even replied if you didn’t push things on me like “you are easy to please” or “people with more awareness” as if you have some higher intelligence because you can point out that the switch isn’t as fast as the other guys. Most people who bought a switch realize this, it’s not news to us, we just don’t care because we are too busy having fun. Just for giggles...compared to a 1080Ti the PS4 pro and X1X are mashed potatoes! Enjoy.